"I was disappointed that we didn't have a better start," Canadiens coach Claude Julien said. "I found that we were a bit flat during the first two periods, and it concerned me, but at least we came out in the third period and we played much better and found a way to win."

Johnson made 27 saves for the Sabres (5-9-3), who are 2-4-1 in their past seven games.

"It was unfortunate because I thought the guys played really hard," Sabres coach Phil Housley said. "We had a lot of great opportunities to make it 2-0, which we didn't, but we hung in there."

Ryan O'Reilly scored an unassisted power-play goal at 19:54 of the first period to give Buffalo a 1-0 lead. O'Reilly scored his sixth goal from the right edge of the crease when the puck bounced to him off the end boards after a goalmouth scramble.

Shaw tied it when he deflected Jonathan Drouin's wrist shot from the point past Johnson for his fourth goal.

"We felt the first period was very poor from our group and being able to rebound and play a decent second and a much better third, we don't want to lose any of this momentum that we feel have right now in terms of our confidence and trending in the right direction," Pacioretty said.

Highlight of the game

They said it

"It was real close. I had to bite. I know he likes to go five-hole and he just went around me. My legs just weren't long enough there to make the save. It's disappointing because I thought we were right there. Good for him, I guess, making that move." -- Sabres goalie Chad Johnson on Max Pacioretty's overtime goal

"Division games are always important, especially where we are. We want to get back to .500 and then go from there, so we're going to take it game by game here." -- Canadiens forward Andrew Shaw